


Car Club Orange

by katnissdoesnotfollowback



Series: Oneshot Collection [18]
Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types, Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins, The Hunger Games (Movies)
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Humor, Mild Language, i feel like this has no tags on it, like maybe one or two swear words?, maybe i need to rethink my life choices, oh right there's kissing, usually i have to add a ton???
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-26
Updated: 2020-04-26
Packaged: 2021-03-02 03:55:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,691
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23858671
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/katnissdoesnotfollowback/pseuds/katnissdoesnotfollowback
Summary: Katniss buys a new car, and while she really didn't want something in bright orange, the car brings other rather unexpected benefits.
Relationships: Katniss Everdeen/Peeta Mellark
Series: Oneshot Collection [18]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/936882
Comments: 24
Kudos: 138





	Car Club Orange

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Buttercupbadass](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Buttercupbadass/gifts).



> This one is from last summer and was written to cheer up my goof friend buttercupbadass, whose orage car has been a source of both laughter and great frustration.

Katniss bites down on her thumb nail and nods along as the salesman goes on and on about options and the new transmission they put in. She only half listens to him backtrack to explain that there’s nothing wrong per se with the design or manufacture of the transmission, just the previous owner was a clunky shifter and a lead foot, and tore it to pieces. She only half listens because she’s stuck on the color.

Orange. Bright fucking orange.

She wouldn’t go so far as to call it traffic cone orange but it sure as shit isn’t the soft burnt orange or maybe even sienna she was expecting based on the pictures online. This car is painted to scream “LOOK AT ME!”

Which means Katniss would rather die than buy this car. Couldn’t they have her ideal car in a soft shade of silver? Nobody notices silver cars. Mainly because there’s just so many of them, but partly because they just sort of seem to fade into the background, unimportant and unnoticed. Completely forgettable, which is exactly what Katniss prefers to be most of the time.

“So, what are we thinking?” The sales guy asks and Katniss cringes.

“Can we have a minute?” Prim says, and Katniss is grateful for her sister’s interference.

“Sure thing. I’ll be right inside. Holler if you need me.”

A few mumbled “Thanks” from the girls and he vanishes. Katniss is still stuck on the color. She’s not sure she’s ever going to get over it.

“Well,” Prim says and Katniss snorts. 

“It’s...it’s…” Katniss waves her hands uselessly at the thing. “I’m gonna need polarized lenses just to be able to look at it in the parking lot!”

“Maybe it reduces the chances of someone cutting you off?” Prim tries to soothe her. Katniss sighs and crosses her arms.

“I really have no choice though.”

“We could go back to--”

“The maintenance I’ll have to put into that piece of shit make it not worth my while,” Katniss cuts her sister off before she can even suggest they go back to the other dealer, the one that had this exact same car in a much more soothing shade of green. Only it also had a laundry list of things needing to be done to it to make it drivable, a list thicker than the paperwork needed for the loan. “No, I need a car sooner than that. Now.”

She starts her new job next week and her decades old reliable Jeep that used to belong to her father finally died last week. It’s been an insane week trying to manage transportation around her work schedule with her three random jobs and Prim’s with her rotations at the clinic. Maybe if the city had slightly less terrifying public transportation she’d be okay using it to come home from the bar at three in the morning, but since it doesn’t and she’s already had about five too many close calls when the Jeep went haywire and she had to rely on the trains anyways….

“Nope. It has to be this one.” It’s the only one in town that’s the right make, model, used but with reasonable mileage and a not terrifying CarFax history, the options she wants, for a price she can actually afford for once...as long as she doesn’t get fired from her new job within the first week. “Maybe I can paint it in a few months,” Katniss says.

“Maybe wait to see how easy it is to find in a parking lot,” Prim teases. “Besides...you don’t wanna hurt his feelings.”

Katniss snorts again, rolling her eyes at her baby sister’s insistence that cars have personalities and feelings, like they’re living beings or something, and waves at the salesman. “Let’s get this over with.”

***********************

It’s shocking how many orange cars there are on the road. Okay, there’s still not that many, but now that she’s driving one, Katniss sees them everywhere.  _ Everywhere. _

She runs her hands over the steering wheel as she pauses at a red light, tapping her left foot in time to her music. A working sound system...that’s a luxury she hasn’t had in awhile, and she’s barely used it since she bought the car, too paranoid that something might go wrong. Instead, she spent the first week of ownership driving in silence, listening intently to the engine noises and flinching anytime something sounded remotely amiss. She can’t afford to have disaster strike on her first day of work, she needs a reliable car.

Remembering this, she quickly flicks off the music and listens to the engine’s throaty growl. Buttercup hasn’t let her down yet. Katniss scowls at the thought of the name Prim gave her truck. Of course Prim decided to name the bright orange Tacoma after that damn cat. Katniss hasn’t missed the cantankerous beast at all...not at all. She’s only tolerating the christening of her truck after that cat to appease Prim, who still mourns the flea bag.

The light turn greens and Katniss moves through the intersection, sighing loudly when the next one turns yellow before she’s halfway down the block. Stopping once more, she glances at the dashboard clock. 

She’s still got plenty of time to stop by that bakery she spotted on her job interview. She really wanted to pop in and try something that day, but it looked like one of those overpriced boutique bakeries, the kind she couldn’t afford. It smelled divine, though and her tastebuds tingle just at the memory of the heavy yeast and sugar scent lingering in the air around the place. Since today is the first day of her comfortably salaried job, she thought she’d treat herself on the way and left extra early just to make sure she’d have time. And also not be late to her new job.

As she waits for the light, something to her right catches her eye and she turns her head. There’s another one, she thinks and shakes her head, astonished at the frequency of her orange car spottings now that she’s driving one herself.

This one is a slightly more muted shade than hers, and a Jeep. There’s an ugly, unidentifiable piece of twisted purple plastic hanging from his rearview mirror, still swaying slightly. The owner is driving with the canvas rolled down, the sleeves of his dress shirt rolled up and his tie comically twisted back over his shoulder, probably blown there from the wind. She can hear the faint beats of his music and watches as he turns his bobbing head in her direction. The early spring breeze ruffles his blonde curls. It’s probably a wonderful spring breeze, fresh and fragrant. The apple trees along Government have bloomed and she thinks maybe it’d be nice to drive with the windows down to see if she could smell them. As long as the garbage and general smell of city isn’t overpowering today. 

Katniss reaches for the window controls when her orange car friend lifts up his sunglasses and smiles at her. She can feel her cheeks heating and a strange churning in her belly. Hunger pangs. She needs to get to that bakery or she’ll be ravenous and cranky all day at work. Maybe she should have saved this bakery trip for another day.

He’s still looking at her! He probably thinks she’s a creep, staring at him like that, and yanks her hand back from the window controls. He nods to her, an almost salute of understanding, a bond in a way, an orange car driver club. There really aren’t that many of them, and so she feels a weird connection to this stranger in the orange Jeep. 

Now she thinks about rolling down the window to speak to him, but what the hell would she say? Congrats on having an obnoxiously colored car? He leaves his glasses perched on top of his head as he grabs the shifter, faces front, and then zips forward in traffic.

“Shit,” she mutters as the person behind her informs her that the light has turned green with a rude honk of the horn. She focuses on driving after that and loses track of the orange Jeep.

She feels a twinge of longing for her old car, but this one’s serving her well so far. The bed is just big enough to help Gale with his eco-friendly cityscaping business on occasion, perfect for all those camping, hunting, and fishing trips he keeps saying they’ll take but neither of them have managed to find the time to take off work. And while she couldn’t find a Jeep this time, driving a truck, even a small one like this, reminds her of home, of driving through the woods and fields with mud splattered up inside the wheel wells and over the sides, her father whooping beside her as he taught her how to control it, correct for slips and slides, and encouraged her. She doubts orange Jeep guy has ever taken his car off pavement and loses herself in a few minutes of imagining herself showing him what his car can really do.

But of course, it’s a big city and she’ll probably never see him again. For some reason, that thought doesn’t sit well with her and she’s frowning when she parks in the small lot next to the bakery.

“Oh well, there’s not much that a good set of buns can’t fix,” Katniss tells herself as she grabs her wallet from the console and heads inside, careful to make sure her truck is locked.

************************

It’s a total disappointment. She runs her tongue over her teeth and works her jaw, trying to unstick the dry as dust excuse for a scone that bakery had the nerves to peddle to her this morning. She considers leaving a really nasty Yelp review, but it will have to wait. The line for the place was shockingly long, given the subpar quality of the baked goods, and she’s getting close to the time she needs to be at work.

“Ugh, not going there for breakfast ever again, Buttercup,” she says and then scowls at the dash. “I’m talking to a car.” 

Wouldn’t Prim just be tickled pink? Just to be safe, she points at the dashboard so he knows she means business. “We will never speak of this again.”

The truck doesn’t answer, of course. Or thank god, rather because she doesn’t need any surprises today. Taking a deep breath, she pulls into the garage she was told was the best place for her to park. Her new company has a deal with the owners so she won’t have to pay for parking, although she was warned that it fills quickly. Craning her neck, she sees that Effie, her new boss’ Executive Assistant, wasn’t joking when she said that. The garage serves as the only parking for almost the entire block and it’s evident in the rows of filled spots. She glances at the clock and feels a quick tug of fear in her gut.

That less than acceptable pastry might make her late after all. “So not worth the $7.50. Dry pastry, burned coffee...aha!” She smiles and swings the wheel around, gasping and slamming on the brakes when she sees that the spot she thought was empty is actually occupied, the orange Jeep hiding behind the massive black Tahoe beside it. Thankfully, the spot beside it is empty.

“Yes!” she says and adjusts to park only one spot over than she’d planned, smiling slightly at her parking neighbor. Another one or…? Nope, she recognizes the weird piece of twisted purple plastic hanging from the rearview mirror. The canvas is up, but that hideous neon thing is like a beacon. As she gathers her things, she wonders which building the blonde man who drives it works in. It’s almost comforting to see a familiar face downtown...or at least a familiar car.

Tugging on her blazer to straighten it, Katniss squares her shoulders, grabs her half-drunk coffee from the hood of her truck, and marches towards her future.

“Ah, Katniss! So wonderful to see you here again! Are you ready for your big, big, big day?”

“I am, Miss Trinkett. Thrilled to be here,” Katniss says and smiles at the woman’s verve.

“Excellent! Haymitch is running a bit late,” she says through her teeth, and Katniss hides a smirk behind her coffee cup as Effie checks a diamond studded watch on her wrist. “But you are not! I do admire punctuality, so let’s get you started!”

Katniss vaguely remembers most of the stops on the brief tour that Effie gives her now. They covered it at the end of her job interview, but the refresher is nice. Katniss has never been good with names. She dubs the girl in the communications department “Glimmer” because the chick is decked out in gems so big and gaudy they’re either worth more than all of Katniss and Prim’s worldly possessions combined times about five...or they’re fake. Kind of like the smile Glimmer gives her.

Slowly, they make their way through the office until they reach the marketing team. “Ah, and these are several people with whom you’ll be working fairly closely, making sure they do not do anything illegal and protecting their work as well. Boys,” she tuts and four heads swivel towards Katniss from inside their rather massive joint cubical. A redhead, a brunette, one with copper hair, and a blonde. She near spits out her coffee when she gets a good look at the face attached to the blonde hair. 

Well, that answers one question about her orange car buddy.

“This is Darius McNally, Johanna Mason, Finnick Odair, and Peeta Mellark,” Effie announces, pointing to each one in turn. “Gentlemen, this is Katniss Everdeen, our new legal team member, specializing in copyright, trademark, and proprietary materials. As you know, it was difficult finding a replacement for Suzanne, so...Be nice.”

Effie points a manicured talon at Johanna and Finnick in turn. They lift their hands in a falsely innocent gesture and Effie’s phone rings then, a loud blare of Britney Spears’  _ Toxic _ . 

“That would be Haymitch,” she says in exasperation. The marketing team hides all manner of laughter and Katniss stifles a snort, wondering what that’s about. “Peeta, be a darling and finish giving Katniss the tour for me, would you?”

Effie doesn’t give Peeta a chance to answer, but hurries off with her phone to her ear, moving exceptionally fast for a woman on four inch Louboutins. Katniss shakes her head and turns back to find that her orange car buddy is now standing in front of her. She takes quick stock of him -- ash blonde hair that falls in waves over his forehead and curls a little on top, medium height, stocky build, warm blue eyes and a sweet smile as he extends his hand to her.

“Peeta Mellark,” he says. “Guess I’m giving you the rest of the tour.”

“I guess so,” she says and shakes his hand. His skin is warm and a little calloused, surprising given his desk job. He clears his throat and motions out towards the aisle again.

“So what all has Effie shown you, so I don’t repeat?” Katniss ticks off the departments she’s been to this morning so far and Peeta nods. “Then let’s hit the really important spots. It’s only a half dozen steps and he points towards a set of labeled doors. “Closest bathroom to the legal department.” Then he turns and walks through a short hall to another room with a table and chairs, a wide window with a stunning view of the city. A row of cabinets and a counter line one of the other walls, a fridge at the end, a microwave, toaster, and coffee pot set on the counter. “Break room.”

“Hm, all the essentials,” she says and he nods.

“This way to the chopping block.”

“The what?” she asks, wrinkling her brow and shaking her head, sure that she heard him wrong.

“Conference room,” he clarifies.

After the conference room, he takes her to IT and introduces her to a man and a woman, both with graying hair and glasses. “Beetee and Wiress here are miracle workers. Anything tech related, they’ll hook you up.”

“Is that a pun?” Wiress asks and Peeta chuckles, the sound warm. Katniss shakes off the tingles down her spine as they continue the tour.

Peeta seems to know everybody and rather than Effies’ very pointed introductions and speedy tour, Peeta’s version takes a bit of time. It’s immediately clear that he’s a people person. He not only knows their names but carries on a short conversation with each of them. Somehow, though, she doesn’t feel like an outsider or tag along at all. He turns it into a chance for Katniss to get to know each person a little, rather than throwing a name and job title at her. Still, it isn’t long before she’s swimming in names. 

“I’ll never remember anybody,” she says.

“Uh sorry about that. I didn’t mean to overwhelm you on your first day.” Katniss waves it off and takes the last sip from her mug, frowning at the thing when she’s done.

“I may need to make another stop at the break room for some decent coffee.”

“Sure,” Peeta says and then steps back to let her lead the way, smiling when she finds it without his help. “Learning your way around already.”

“I used to spend a lot of time in the woods with my dad. Had to find your way with landmarks most of the time, and I guess I developed a good sense of direction.”

“That’ll help. I spent the first month of my time here asking directions,” Peeta says as Katniss pours herself some coffee and adds the sugar. “So did you find parking alright?”

“I did,” Katniss says and then ducks her head to hide her blush. “Actually, uh...I parked next to you.”

“Yeah? How do you…?” he asks and his own cheeks turning a little pink. 

“Orange Tacoma,” she says pointing to herself, then to him. “Orange Jeep.”

“I thought you looked familiar,” he says with a smile. “Car club orange.” He lifts his hand, palm flat, and she feels ridiculous, but she lifts her own and smacks his lightly in a high-five. Her cheeks warm a little, hoping she doesn’t think he’s a stalker or something. 

“I recognized the color along with the weird purple plastic modern art hanging from the rearview mirror.”

“Ah...yeah my niece made that a few years ago after I got in a pretty bad wreck, totaled my old car. She claims it’s my guardian angel. Haven’t gotten in a wreck since she gave it to me, so...”

“Oh,” Katniss says. Now she feels bad for insulting his niece’s artwork.

“It’s okay. She had to explain what it is to half our family too, including me,” he says, looking chagrined. Katniss tries to backpedal and not insult him.

“So your Jeep was a replacement for that car?”

“Yep. Really didn’t want the hassle of buying a brand new car at the time, but didn’t have much of a choice.”

“Same here,” Katniss says, feeling much better about the new direction of the conversation. “Was your Jeep the only one in the city you could afford, too? Because I almost went back and bought a POS that needed about a thousand or five dollars in maintenance instead of getting that radioactive looking truck. I really wanted something more natural, like green. And the weird thing is, ever since I started driving it, I keep seeing orange cars.”

Peeta huffs, an amused look on his face and he tilts his head to examine her. “Actually no. Orange is my favorite color.”

************************

“Stupid, stupid, stupid,” she mutters as she swivels one way and then the next. It turned out to be a hell of a day. First she insulted Peeta twice in the space of about five minutes. “So good with the first impressions, Katniss.” Then she discovered real quick, when Haymitch called a staff meeting and basically eviscerated her in front of half the staff, why the conference room is referred to as “The Chopping Block.”

“Don’t take it too hard. He does that to everyone on their first day. You handled it a hell of a lot better than Glinda did,” Peeta had reassured her afterwards and she was considering locking herself in the ladies’ room for the rest of the day, or maybe flushing herself down the drain because that would be far less embarrassing than facing her coworkers for the rest of the day.

“Who’s Glinda?” Katniss had asked and Peeta quickly described the gaudy bedecked girl from communications. “Oh, Glimmer.”

Peeta had lifted one eyebrow and half smiled at her as Katniss groaned and covered her face in embarrassment.

“God I’m just knocking this first impression thing out of the park,” she had muttered and Peeta laughed as she scurried away from him, ignoring him calling after her. She had holed herself up in her office the rest of the day, poring over documents and talking only to the legal team, getting a feel for the job and the company and learning the specifics so she’d be prepared for tomorrow.

It was a grueling day, and now she can’t find her damn car. The stupid radioactive orange thing has somehow vanished in this drab concrete tower of despair, where it should stand out, a beacon of tacky paint color. That thought has her cringing at how she’d insulted Peeta so glibly, and of course, as if her day weren’t already stellar, her thoughts seem to conjure him.

“Lose your truck?”

“Nope,” she says, shaking her head and staring at the ceiling. “I just love the smell of parking decks.”

“You mean burning rubber, puke, and piss?” he asks and she laughs as Peeta stands next to her. She looks over at him, wondering why he was so nice to her, even after she insulted him. “Come on, you’re only a level away, although I have to wonder at your claims of having a keen sense of direction.”

“Everything looks the same in here. And the cars are all different from this morning.”

“Good point,” Peeta says and as they round the corner, he points to the number on the wall. “Maybe you’ll have better luck using these as landmarks.”

“Gee, thanks.” Katniss sneers and keeps pace as they walk towards their cars. As they get close, she sighs. She really doesn’t want everyone to hate her, and Peeta was really nice to her today, taking time of his own busy work schedule to help her out. She’s not good at forgiving, nor is she good at asking for forgiveness, so she takes a deep breath before taking the plunge. “Look, I’m sorry. I didn’t know--”

“Don’t worry about it, Katniss. I’d be a bit of a baby if I got all offended at your comments about my favorite color.” Katniss wrinkles her nose at his easy acceptance.

“It’s just...it’s my first day, and I’m not good with...people, or first impressions. I was almost late because I wanted to treat myself to breakfast at this bakery I was curious about and that backfired. So I’m apparently not good at picking bakeries either so really my judgement is suspect.”

“What bakery?”

“Cakes and More, but what’s it matter?”

“Hm,” Peeta says as they reach their cars. “Well, if it helps any, I’ll say again that you did a whole helluva lot better on your first day than about 90% of the employees here. You didn’t send a raunchy joke to the entire upper management, you didn’t get your hair caught on a fire extinguisher or drag toilet paper around on your heel half the day, you didn’t have a melt down in front of Haymitch but held your own, and you didn’t spew anything offensive. Just a tiny insult about my favorite color.”

“Wait...who sent a raunchy joke on their first day?” Katniss asks and Peeta smiles.

“Tell you what,” he says and pulls a notepad from his pocket. He flips through it and she catches a few glimpses of drawings, but not enough to discern the subjects or skill level. He starts writing something. “Let me give you the address of a bakery that’s never, ever going to disappoint you. Try it out tomorrow, come to work ready to kick ass, because I get the impression you’re a kick-ass, take names kind of person.”

She blushes at this, especially since he says it with a smile, as though it’s something that he’d like in her, kicking ass and taking names.

“And if it disappoints, I will tell you every last awful story about our coworkers I can think of as consolation.” He rips out the sheet of paper and holds it out for her to take. She darts her eyes between it his and the piece of paper, tilting her head to examine him. This sounds like strings attached, like he’s wrangling for a date or something.

“And if it doesn’t disappoint?” His smile widens and he waves the paper at her.

“Then you start the day with the best breakfast imaginable, ready to take on the world.” It can’t be that simple, but she takes the paper and turns to climb into her truck. “Have a good night, Katniss.”

She waves at him and keeps her focus on what she’s doing, although she does notice that even though he’s ready to leave before her, he waits and lets her pull out first.

“Too much of a gentleman,” she mutters. “Gotta be hiding something.”

***********************

“Of course,” she says and almost laughs when she reads the name on the bakery’s awning.

_ Mellark’s Bakery _

If she says it’s terrible, she’ll be insulting him again. If she says it’s not, she’ll either be lying or she’ll owe him. Still, she’s hungry. And she won’t give him a reason to pester her about coming back here.

She pushes the door open and inhales the scents, quickly perusing the options and making her selection, unsurprised when the man who helps her is blonde haired and blue eyed, stocky build with a kind smile. Peeta’s brother, maybe. She waits for her food and takes a tentative sip of the coffee. She pulls the cup from her mouth and stares at the opening on it.

“Fuck.”

It doesn’t disappoint. Not at all. In fact, once she’s finished her pastry, she considers being late to work to go back for another. Instead, she laughs at herself when she finds an empty spot next to Peeta’s Jeep again and parks, a spring in her step as she heads inside. She spent some time doing research last night, so she’s ready for Haymitch’s rapid fire, blushes when Peeta catches her eye after and lifts his mug in silent toast to her.

************************

It happens slowly, over months. It starts with them walking together out to their cars, which somehow they keep winding up parked next to or at least close to one another. Then it’s taking turns stopping at his family’s bakery for breakfast. Lunches in the break room, and laughing as he slowly gives her every last one of the stories he once promised to her. But now they’re funny and the person they’re about is usually present too, laughing along with her and Peeta. And she doesn’t mind it so much when she has a bad day and Haymitch roasts her on the Chopping Block for it. Because slowly, she comes to understand each of the coworkers, to appreciate that the reason they give her looks of sympathy on those days isn’t because they think less of her, but because they’ve been in her place too.

Then she’s invited to a happy hour and actually goes, spends the time laughing until her cheeks hurt, and grateful when Peeta offers to drive her home because she drank and he didn’t. She’s not even embarrassed by the stacks of legal pads covering almost every surface or the house plants growing out of control everywhere in her apartment when he sees it for the first time.

“Sometimes I miss the woods,” she murmurs as he tucks her into bed and leaves her alone.

Then it’s an offer for a working dinner to finish a project and she spends more of the time staring around his apartment at all the artwork than she does focusing on their actual work. She’s hungry to learn more about him, but can’t because there’s a group of them gathered. She settles for running her hands over the upholstery like maybe she could absorb their soothing shades and the softness and warmth with the unexpected strength and heat underneath that is all Peeta, and carry him with her when she leaves.

They share more personal things during lunch after that, or spend far too much time standing in the parking deck talking. Eventually they start meeting up for breakfast away from work.

He shares some of his drawings with her, stories about his dad and growing up a baker, but needing to find something else because his two older brothers and their families were almost more than a small bakery chain could support. She tells him about her own parents and losing her dad, and thousands of stories about Prim and how proud she is of her sister who's going to be a doctor and save people’s lives.

Then one day, she’s rear ended at a stop light on her way to work and Peeta’s number is the one she dials after the police. He’s there in minutes, rubbing her arms and soothing her, offering to drive her car to follow her to the nearest body shop to then drive her to work or home. “Whichever you need.”

Her truck is down for a week, and Peeta’s there in the mornings to pick her up, take her for a breakfast and then to work. She gets used to it, even though she knows he’s driving out of his way and there is probably someone else closer who could drive her with less hassle. Sometime during that drive, he tells her about his own wreck, the one that totaled his car and almost his whole life. He mentions the things that were lost somewhere or were stolen from his wrecked car.

“But I think the thing that upsets me the most is my losing my iPod,” he says with a straight face and she laughs because it’s ridiculous, missing the iPod when she already knows by now that he lost a leg in that wreck, too. And his mother, in a way, she finds out when he picks her up, visibly distraught. They’re late to work that day as they sit on her couch and he pours out his past, his mother’s abuse and how he ran into her last night at the grocery store, of all places and he couldn’t sleep.

Katniss calls in sick for both of them when he falls asleep on her couch. She lets him sleep all day and works from home instead, ready for him with a good hearty stew when he wakes up.

The day her truck is ready, she wakes feeling sad, not understanding why. She took the day off, to give the truck a good long drive and also because she just isn’t feeling up to working today. Peeta offered to go with her, suggested they drive out of the city and maybe have a picnic somewhere away from anything made of concrete. She doesn’t understand why she’s sad about this. She should be excited to be doing something she loves with Peeta. She doesn’t understand until she answers the door for Peeta and he smiles at her. 

“Ready?”

No, she wants to say. She’s not ready for this to end. Her hand moves without her bidding, sliding through the hair at the nape of his neck. Her feet move her body closer, all of it meant to bring him closer. Closer still. To bring his lips to hers so she can taste and smell and  _ feel _ him. Soft and warm...and unmoving.

Dread fills her for one second while he just stands there. Then he makes a soft noise in his throat. His hands caress over the sides of her neck, into her hair. His thumbs wear tracks over her jaw as he kisses her back, rubbing back and forth. She stumbles and falls back against the door frame, bringing her other hand up to hold onto his shoulder, then into his hair as she parts her lips and Peeta accepts the invitation with a hungry groan. His arms wrap around her and she flattens herself against his sturdy frame, wanting this to never ever end as a warmth fills her, blooms from her chest out to her fingertips.

“Katniss,” he says as she moves her lips to kiss down his throat. “Buttercup.”

“The damn truck can wait,” she says and pulls him inside her apartment, slamming the door on the rest of the world.

************************

Katniss bites down on her thumbnail as she stares at the back ends of the two cars parked in the garage attached to the townhome. Peeta slides his fingers between hers, pulling her hand away from her mouth.

“What’s wrong?”

“It’s just...it’s like those moments when you realize you wore the same thing…” Peeta thinks for a moment and then starts laughing. She joins in too, thinking that this makes them permanently  _ that  _ old couple. “I’m sorry, Peeta. You’re just going to have to buy a new car.”

“I had mine first,” he argues and turns her around to face him. “But the real problem we’re going to have is whose car do we take every morning to work? Orange or…”

“Orange?” she asks with a laugh and he nods as he lowers his head to hers.

“Such an impossible decision.”

Not really, she thinks as she kisses her fiancé and new roommate.


End file.
